4/30/2017

he lie we were told as kids was this: The end of American liberty would come at the hands of the political right.

Conservatives would take away our right to speak our minds, and use the power of government to silence dissent. The right would intimidate our teachers and professors, and coerce the young.

And then, with the universities in thrall, with control of the apparatus of the state (and the education bureaucracy), the right would have dominion over a once-free people.

Some of us were taught this in school. Others, who couldn’t be bothered to read books, were fed a cartoon version of the diabolical conservative in endless movies and TV shows. The most entertaining of these were science fiction, sometimes with vague references to men in brown shirts and black boots goose-stepping in some future time.

Women would become handmaids, subjugated and turned into breeders. And men would be broken as well. The more lurid fantasies offered armies of Luddites in hooded robes, hunting down subversives for the greater good.

But the lie is obvious now, isn’t it?

Because it is not conservatives who coerced today’s young people or made them afraid of ideas that challenge them. Conservatives did not shame people into silence, or send thugs out on college campuses to beat down those who wanted to speak.

The left did all that.

It’s there in front of you, the thuggish mobs of the left killing free speech at American universities. The thugs call themselves antifas, for anti-fascists.

They beat people up and break things and set fires and intimidate. These are not anti-fascists. These are fascists. This is what fascists do.

Claiming total certainty about the science traduces the spirit of science and creates openings for doubt whenever a climate claim proves wrong.

Demanding abrupt and expensive changes in public policy raises fair questions about ideological intentions. Censoriously asserting one’s moral superiority and treating skeptics as imbeciles and deplorables wins few converts. None of this is to deny climate change or the possible severity of its consequences. But ordinary citizens also have a right to be skeptical of an overweening scientism…. Perhaps if there had been less certitude and more second-guessing in Clinton’s campaign, she’d be president. Perhaps if there were less certitude about our climate future, more Americans would be interested in having a reasoned conversation about it.

As a result of such heresy, liberals are canceling their subscriptions to The New York Times in mass numbers. All because an individual’s views fulfilled the very mission statement of the media outlet:

Only by having a staff as wide as it is deep, broad in perspective, backgrounds and experiences are we able to capture the multitude of voices of America and the world, with true fidelity.

The insidious closed-minded screams of the left deafen on a daily basis.

Yet they keep allowing them to call themselves “Antifa”. Talk about Orwellian. Blah Blah may not be so far off as some think. If these types win the next election will WE have free speech at all? Or any other rights not approved by “Antifa”?

They still believe the 2016 election was stolen from them and that with their base now energized, 2018 and 2020 will be the years they take back the country. Based on that, they see no need to compromise even with someone who was hard-core NeverTrump over the past two years, like Brett Stephens.

It will take election losses in 2018 and 2020 before they even consider faking listening to opposing viewpoints.

Antifa is a conspiracy to use violence and the threat of violence to suppress First Amendment expression. Antifa makes no secret about that: it openly describes that it will use violence to deter people with wrongthink opinions from public demonstrations. Using violence to suppress first amendment activity is a violation of California civil rights statutes including the Bane Act and the Ralph Act.

Every person who masks up to attend an Antifa “counter-demonstration” (read: lynch mob) is a co-conspirator. Even if they don’t personally throw rocks, bricks, and M80 explosives, and even if they aren’t personally swinging fists and sticks, they are knowingly and intentionally forming a mob to give cover to people who are directly carrying out violence. So every member of the crowd is violating civil rights statutes. Every member of the Antifa crowd deserved to be beaten in the street like the scum that they are. I’m glad that some of them were beaten.

When people conspire to use deadly force to prevent protected first amendment activity, that violates their affirmative right under the California Constitution, Article I to free expression. (The California Constitution provides an AFFIRMATIVE right, not just a statement that Congress Shall Make No Law abridging the freedom)

People have a right to peacefully counter-demonstrate speech with which they disagree (to express contradictory ideas and/or to express approval/disapproval with some other demonstration). But they have no right to use violence or the threat of violence to suppress speech with which they disagree. The use of force to defend people engaged in free expression (including self-defense and defense of others) is not only lawful, it is righteous. It is a good thing when Antifa is beaten in the streets like the scum that they are.

Antifa had no right to display anarcho-communist flags on the streets of Berkeley on April 15, because the anarcho-communist flags were used to incite the imminent unlawful use of deadly force against conservatives for engaging in lawful First Amendment activity. The conservatives in Berkeley were right to break through Antifa ranks and seize the anarcho-communist flags from the physically-weaker Bolshevik scum. No law prohibited that socially-useful application of violence.

The City of Berkeley intentionally withheld police protection from the conservatives because it wanted to allow Antifa to intimidate them into silence, or failing that, to allow Antifa to beat them into submission. Mayor Arreguin made statements on Twitter approving of the use of violence to prevent Milo from speaking and he’s a member of the By Any Means Necessary terrorist group’s Facebook page. That makes the entire City, including the Mayor and Chief of Police, as co-conspirators to deny civil rights to conservatives in and around Berkeley.

The decision to withhold police protection created a dangerous situation where Antifa was permitted to throw rocks and explosives at conservatives (assault and battery), and pepper spray them, and pull them into crowds so the physically-weaker Antifa scum could stomp on the outnumbered, isolated conservatives (false imprisonment). All of this violated the Bane Act and Ralph Act.

Given the dangerous situation, and the illegal actions of Antifa, it was reasonable for conservatives to use violence to defend themselves. It’s called “self-defense” and it’s protected by, among other things, the First Amendment, Second Amendment, and the California Constitution, Article I. The City is further attempting to intimidate conservatives by arresting some of them for actions taken in self-defense and taken to vindicate their rights under Article I. The City even banned them, on April 15, from carrying SHIELDS, because it wanted Antifa to more easily be able to throw rocks and bricks at them. That is how depraved the City of Berkeley is.

The dangerous situation disproportionately burdens the ability of marginalized communities to engage in free expression. Seniors, disabled, women, etc. are less able to speak because they are more vulnerable to being pepper sprayed, hit in the head, beaten, etc. than able-bodied, physically-fit young- and middle-aged men, especially men with military training. Free speech belongs to ALL of us, not just able-bodied, physically-fit men with military training. Free speech belongs to people willing to put their bodies on the line to defend it–and it also belongs to people who won’t do that.

Even if the City contends that it acted in good faith to try to create a lawful, viewpoint-neutral policy that balanced various interests (which I do not believe for one second: Mayor Arreguin is on the BAMN facebook group), the City’s policy of withholding police protection impermissibly puts an undue burden on the exercise of free expression rights by seniors, disabled, women, etc. and by journalists to document the City’s illegal actions. The City CANNOT simply allow armed groups to “fight it out” in the streets to see who gets to have the right of free expression–that is a false kind of neutrality. It is not viewpoint-neutral because it permits whichever group has more muscle to speak. And the City definitely cannot put its thumb on the scale by disarming conservatives while allowing Antifa to bring weapons (after both sides were disarmed, the conservatives were surrounded by Antifa, who brought in more people carrying weapons, and the City did not make an effort to disarm these additional people–allowing Antifa but not conservatives to have weapons). That is even worse than a false neutrality.

A similar policy by the City and County of Los Angeles would likewise be illegal for the same reason. I hope attorneys who work for the City/County have provided appropriate memoranda about the illegality of a policy that permits terrorists to use deadly force against people because of their political views. I hope the prosecutor’s office is prepared to prosecute City/County officials who conspire with terrorists to suppress free expression by Angelenos. Likewise I hope no one in the prosector’s office is going to violate the civil rights of Angelenos by prosecuting them for lawful actions in defense of Constitutional rights.

Tell me where I’m wrong about the law.

Tell me why we should not celebrate the brave men who put their bodies on the line to vindicate our rights as equal citizens in the face of terrorism by Antifa and the City of Berkeley. At least one of them was sliced open with a knife and others were hit in the head with a heavy metal bike lock.

Tell me why we should not celebrate the use of violence in self-defense and to vindicate Constitutional rights. If leftists support the use of violence to suppress our civil rights, then leftists SHOULD be beaten in the street with sticks.

Here is a photograph of Kyle Chapman (Based Stickman) – in the Texas hoodie next to Mr. McInnes. You can see he does not look like a goat-molesting white nationalist. His crew is as diverse as any mainstream Republican group.

I hope Los Angeles tomorrow will enforce the laws in an appropriate manner to enable Mr. Chapman, Proud Boys, Latinos for Trump, and any other conservatives who want to speak freely to peacefully counter-demonstrate on May Day. Which is their right. (Since when did liberals discover that they were against counter-demonstrations? That’s half of what they do given that they don’t do anything constructive)

But if not–if Mayor Garcetti intends to use Antifa as muscle to silence conservatives in violation of the Bane Act and the Ralph Act–then I hope the conservatives metaphorically cuckhold Mr. Garcetti by beating the snot out of his Antifa terrorists. Because if they don’t succeed in self-defense, one or more conservatives are going to be murdered in the street. We will be officially second-class citizens.

Our freedom is on the line tomorrow, and some brave men and women are going to put their bodies on the line to defend our freedom. I’m not going to look down my nose at them.

Not surprised, considering that the biggest tax (property) is its bread and butter, Catholicism (the system of next resort in most other states) was the oppressors’ faith, and places like Collin County would not want “demand” from Dallas County making a bee line for its “supply” of classrooms.

Tennessee put the kibosh on vouchers when they were told they’d have to give them to Muslim schools too.

My daughter opted, at the last minute, to go to the local public high school instead of the Catholic school. Her dance group just gave a recital. Three performances. I went to all three. Two of the numbers were a tap dance to the Batman theme and a kind of ballet with Japanese fans to Queen’s “Killer Queen”. I’d like to see a parochial school do that.

If it’s Lane Tech, you know that alums with multiple degrees still make the room to put that on their resumes for professional full time positions. Supposedly that was the one HS that could away with its alums doing that.

This is confusing: I believe science itself demands skepticism. Especially when holes have blown into alleged models evidencing a point of view as fact. Because, as we know, the science is anything but settled, which is what Stephens cautioned about… And if this weren’t a religion to the left, as are their many other boilerplate issues, a vigorous debate would ensue, and both sides would welcome the opportunity to publicly persuade and prove. The same would be true of any speaker coming to a college campus to discuss an unpopular POV. If one were solidly convinced of their POV, they would not only welcome an open and vigorous debate, they would encourage it, they would demand it. If convinced that one’s beliefs are right and good, then there would be nothing to lose, only to gain. That the left remains wed to their self-limiting orthodoxy and expects their tribe to do so too, is just a big giant red flag of warning. The right, of course, needs to push back, foster debate, and never be silent. Skepticism is always beneficial and a good starting point and means of staying focused on digging for truth. Therefore I want to see a huge push back, and push for debate, but I don’t want to see the right becoming like the left or the Antifa thugs. With the media consistently complicit with the left, it can only damage the right. Not to mention, distract from foundational principles and positions that we know work, and would benefit all Americans at all levels the economic ladder.

Dana, I’d like to distinguish between the Bret Stephens situation and Berkeley. The NYT readers cancelling their subscriptions is fine. Like DCSCA says, people don’t want to be informed they want to be entertained, and if Stephens is not entertaining NYT’s readers they have the same right not top pay for the NYT as I do not to pay for Star Wars VII.

Berkeley is a violation of civil rights which are protected by the Constitution since Berkeley is a public university. Moreover, not only the Berkeley administration, but also the Berkeley mayor and police and even Governor Brown have refused to protect the unpopular speakers. There, I would like to see the federal government use the full force of the Civil Rights Acts and the Anti-Ku Klan Acts (really) against the protesters. To put some of the ANSWER and BLM thugs in prison and give their victims an easier avenue to sue the university, the city and the state for damages.

Susan Fitzwater Ambler, PA 2 days ago
From a scientist with a lot of experience in dealing with noisy data:

People who emphasize the uncertainties in the conclusions about climate change rarely acknowledge that the uncertainties are decreasing. We are getting better quality data, and more of it. Of course, that may change if the Trumpists get their way.

The first question, the main question, the only question, with regard to AGW is now and has always been “How hot is it going to get?” They call this the climate sensitivity to a doubling of co2.
That’s the question they spend a lot of money on. Papers written every couple months with a new estimate.

According to the AR4 report, the “likely equilibrium range of sensitivity” was 2.0 to 4.5°C per CO2 doubling. According to the newer AR5 report, it is 1.5 to 4.5°C, i.e., the likely equilibrium sensitivity is now known less accurately.

It’s happening in Berkeley, it’s happening in Portland (where the masked mobs are telling the police who is allowed to march in a parade and who isn’t), it’s happening at Claremont College (all sorts of idiocy including warning white women which earrings are disallowed “or else!”). Where will it stop?

The funniest thing of all is that these nitwits could be stopped immediately if just a few political and/or Hollywood liberals decided to defend the Constitution and walk in to one of these places with Charles Murray or Ann Coulter…. or march with Republicans in Portland…….you know, kind of like Charlton Heston marching with MLK because it was the right thing to do.

This puts the lie to everything they spout about tolerance and equality.

As to Brett Stephens, I’ve asked repeatedly on alarmists sites to quote the part of his column which was the biggest lie or the most offensive……they refuse to reply other than with ad hominem and invective. The man actually wrote a column agreeing that the earth was warming (it’s been warming since the end of the most recent ice age with sporadic cooling phases – you know, climate change), that man is a factor in the warming, but cautioning that truth must prevail over hysteria to get the message out and they respond with….hysteria.

This is a watershed moment for the New York Times. Will they cave in or will they practice journalism?

Judging by their recent declaration that with Trump rules and objectivity no longer apply and their even more recent opinion piece endorsing the heckler’s veto on college campuses, the outlook is not good.

But stranger things can happen and there might actually be someone on the Times staff who realizes they could be next……..

I certainly agree with differences you’ve demonstrated between Berkley thugs and climate alarmists. What I was trying get at is that both mindsets draw from the same well of strident and severe religiosity and authoritarianism. Therefore any who deviate from the standards they deem as acceptable are heretics.

I thought Hestons turn was more of a slow boil. Supposedly his journey began when he saw a 1964 campaign billboard with Barry Goldwater’s image and the message “deep down you know he’s right”. He still supported LBJ and Humphrey, but was already deminstrating his 2nd Am. bonafides by then. Wasn’t really full conservative until the respective 76 and 80 Reagan campaigns.

Heston was a conservative Democrat (they actually had them in those days) when he demonstrated at segregated lunch counters in Oklahoma and later marched in the south, but he was still a conservative who many southern Democrats condemned for meddling.

He was also an avid hunter and shooter since childhood. As with many other Americans, his knowledge of firearms helped him discern when liberals spoke out their backsides regarding firearms and the 2nd Amendment.

It was the Democratic Party that left Chuck, not the other way around.

When he died and liberal Hollywood was dancing and spitting on his grave, there was still a small memorial vigil in Los Angeles at the corner of Martin Luther King Jr Blvd and Crenshaw. Some of the folks in that neighborhood remembered.

The NYT editor responds with reason to the complaints about Stephen’s heresy:

If all of our columnists and all of our contributors and all of our editorials agreed all of the time, we wouldn’t be promoting the free exchange of ideas, and we wouldn’t be serving our readers very well.

The crux of the matter here is whether the questions Bret’s raising and the positions he’s taking are outside the bounds of reasonable discussion. I don’t think a fair reading of his column remotely supports that conclusion — quite the opposite, actually. He’s capturing and contributing to a vitally important debate, and engaging that debate directly helps each of us clarify what we think. We’re already getting some spirited and constructive responses, and I’m looking forward to reflecting those views in our pages, too.

New Zealand’s “fearsome” military: A dagger poised at the heart of Antarctica.

New Zealand declared itself a “nuclear-free zone” back in the ’80s. I remember it well — it caused almost fifteen minutes of discussion on PBS. That included U.S. nuclear-powered ships and submarines within its 12-mile limit, as well as nuclear warheads. In response, the United States suspended our ANZUS obligations to it and it’s no longer under our defense umbrella.

But what else would you expect from the descendants of pickpockets and prostitutes who were kicked out of England? It’s a good thing it has the Maoris to give it some semblance of manhood.

I suspect that a lot of the transgenders cut their weewees off because they feel inadequate as men and will have an easier time of time of it competing with the world in the “women’s category”. Generally, and not only in sports.

The City of Berkeley intentionally withheld police protection from the conservatives because it wanted to allow Antifa to intimidate them into silence, or failing that, to allow Antifa to beat them into submission. Mayor Arreguin made statements on Twitter approving of the use of violence to prevent Milo from speaking and he’s a member of the By Any Means Necessary terrorist group’s Facebook page….The City even banned them, on April 15, from carrying SHIELDS, because it wanted Antifa to more easily be able to throw rocks and bricks at them. That is how depraved the City of Berkeley is.

If it’s like that, the city itself is violating their civil rights, and they should be sued, and DOJ should launch an investigation (although it is hard to see the civil servannts doing that)

There might, however, be some way of putting pressure on their supporters.

And demonstrations against the city government of Berkeley.

Of course there should be a boycott of Berkeley, if you are going to imitate their tactics, and a boycott of those people who don’t boycott erkeley. Anyway, just in self defense people have to avoid Berkeley.

Tell me why we should not celebrate the use of violence in self-defense and to vindicate Constitutional rights.

Violence even in self-defense is not somethng to ceebrate, unless maybe you there’s a big war, in which case what you’re celebrating is not the violence, but the victory. We’re not at the stage where someone is ;osing a wat. By the way, I don’t think Lincoln called for a celebration at the end of the ivil wr. He had a different idea. With malice toward none.

If leftists support the use of violence to suppress our civil rights, then leftists SHOULD be beaten in the street with sticks.

You are in favor of beating people who are not necessarily committed to beating other people, or haven’t started. Isn’t ot better to de-escalate? If it’s possible.

As to Brett Stephens, I’ve asked repeatedly on alarmists sites to quote the part of his column which was the biggest lie or the most offensive……they refuse to reply other than with ad hominem and invective.

Like most people against free speech, they want to shut him up because he’s right, not beceause he’s wrong. Their argument that he’s wrong is based on the vehemence and teh vitriolity of their objections. That’s their argument. If people are so much against him, he must be wrong, and/or his ideas very very dangerous.

I often use tranny in my daily conversation. Usually in reference to the Chrysler Torqueflight or the Chebby TH350. The Chrysler is plenty stout as it comes from the factory. The Chebby is like the six million dollar man. We can rebuild him stronger, faster, more humongous.

I think Bret stephens actually pulled his punches, and he’s arguing on the wrong territory. The question is not whether or not there is some climate change due to human activity, the question is whether it makes any sense to do anything about it, (especially the proposed “remedy” of adding a little less carbon dioxide every year) and it doesn’t.

It doesn’t because it is not doing any great harm, and may even be a net benefit; the effects of doing anything are both unpredictable and trivial if correct; the disruption to modern life of making even a small change in CO2 emissions are vast, and the proposed changes may also mostly only shift it around; mitigation and adjusting to the climate change is much easier, if you do any geo-engineering, there are better ways.

OK, full disclosure, my first car was a ’68 Ranchero, 302 with a C4 A/T. I hot rodded the hell out of and had problems with everything but the tranny. After that that every Ford I’ve owned has had a manual transmission.

This guy revisits set locations for the original Heston Planet of the Apes 55 YEARS AFTER (2011)nputting himself into the scene.

Most of the early scenes of a desert-like terrain were shot in northern Arizona near the Grand Canyon, the Colorado River, Lake Powell, Glen Canyon and other locations near Page, Arizona

Most scenes of the ape village were filmed on the Fox Ranch in Malibu Creek State Park, northwest of Los Angeles.

The concluding beach scenes were filmed on a stretch of California seacoast between Malibu and Oxnard with cliffs that towered 130 feet above the shore. Reaching the beach on foot was virtually impossible, so cast, crew, film equipment, and even horses had to be lowered in by helicopter.

The remains of the Statue of Liberty were shot in a secluded cove on the far eastern end of Westward Beach, between Zuma Beach and Point Dume in Malibu.

I’ve seen warmers use pictures of Lake Powell lake level as “evidence”, using the bathtub ring as an OMG we have to do something illustration of global warming you can see.
Never mind Lake Powell water level is controlled by dam.
In this video the lake level is obviously higher with direct comparison between 2011 and 1967.

The human roundup scene while no longer featuring a corn field, (the corn was planted special for the movie) has panoramic views of the surrounding hills which are more lush with natural vegetation than the 1967 location.

The sea shore scenes show little if any change at all. Where’s the beach erosion? The sea level is exactly the same as evidenced by key rock outcropping. After fifty years, because it’s cut off from easy foot traffic and development, nothing is changed. Familiar. Eerily untouched.

“#TheResistance is not really resisting Trump as much as it is resisting us. The elite establishment is outraged that we normals have demanded to govern ourselves rather than begging for scraps from our betters in DC, NY and LA. It wasn’t just that horrible, sick old woman that we rejected; it was them. And by doing so, we ‘stole’ what they see as their birthright to reign sovereign over us. . . . This election was about the people they sought to rule looking at them and their track record of failure and saying, ‘Nah, you suck.’”

“…#The Resistance is a mess. Now they’re reduced to fighting for supremacy in their final redoubt, the universities where their fascist intimidation and suppression of speech provides a glimpse of America as it would have been had Trump not been elected. That they are forced into a last-ditch effort to keep power in an institution where their control is total is proof positive of their weakness.”

Calling anything science, with a capital S is just a way of saying that the proposition that yoiu are propounding is truth, with a capital T and infallaible. Karl Marx called what he wrote science, and not because it was.

I don’t know what the big deal is. If you want to wear a dress, get yourself one of those Scottish rigs. Tots publicly acceptable. Conversation starter even. You can even do the blue William Wallace face paint, and go full bad a55, if the makeup is your thing.

The Bruce Jenner thing, that’s guys trying to perpetrate a fraud. The bald dishonesty of the exercise is the thing I find objectionable. Not the dress wearing per se.

“Mr. Trump has struggled so colorfully the past three months, we’ve barely noticed his great good luck—that in that time the Democratic Party and the progressive left have been having a very public nervous breakdown.

. . .

“I thought Mr. Trump was supposed to be the loudmouth vulgarian who swears in public. They are aping what they profess to hate. They excoriated him for lowering the bar. Now look at them.

“And they’re doing it because they have nothing else—not a plan, not a program, not a philosophy that can be uttered.”

This is a wonderful time for American politics. The crazies are legion and they are putting on quite a show. The insanity emanating from the left, as well as other quarters, has left most of us shaking our heads. I had no idea what a tonic Donald Trump would be for our country. This national clown show reminds me of a line from I Claudius: “Let all the poison that lurks in the mud, hatch out.” And hatch-out they have. To anyone with their wits still about them, this is the mother of all “teachable moments.”

It’s not just Trump who has been lucky. All of us share his good fortune in living through this collective nervous breakdown, our children especially. What better refutation of the political indoctrination they have received through our schools and media? How can they not question the authority they have been inculcated to revere when their attention-whoring betters act like this? I’m feeling more sanguine about our children’s future all the time.

#94 papertiger, i think the area of the Fox Ranch where they filmed Planets is also where they later filmed the opening segment to M*A*S*H (the tv show, not the movie)

it’s amazing how right over the PCH are these wonderful rolling hills and meadows
you would never otherwise guess that you’re just a hop, skip, and jump away from the pacific ocean
very similar terrain to the Santa Ynez area north of Santa Barbara where reagan had his ranch

Bret Stephens doesn’t make much of an argument in his inaufural column, and I think that’s part of the reason it got such a bad reaction. It’s not convincing, at all. He tried to deal gently with the New York Times readers and it doesn’t work. You can’t speak like Mr. Rogers. He should have written a column just like the columns he wrote for the Wall Street Journal. It shouldn’t have been like he expects people to be skeptical, and then tries to make an argument for uncertainty.

He starts off with the mistake that the book “Shatered” says Hillary Clinton made in her campaign – being too certain she would win.

[according to the excerpt in today’s New York Post, linked to by Colonel Haiku at 100 that error stemmed from assuming they could not affect who people wanted for president, but they could affect turnout, and they got Democratic turnout up in swing states – they didn’t bother in non-swing states like Wisconsin – and they assumed Donald Trump would get less than the regular Republican vote – they missed that some undecided would go for Trump but none would go for Hillary – the book doesn’t actually say all that last point.

There’s a point in the excerpt that I think people can misunderstand. When Bill Clinton, after asking about returns in Florida, and being told especially about Pasco county, where people frm the midwest moved, and whose voting shouldreflect that in Ohio and other plaaces, told Terry McAuliffe not to go New York for the victory party, it wasn’t that he thought at that point they would lose, but he thought it would not be a clear victory early in the night. It was not going to be a clear victory for her at least until on the misddle of te next day. That was teh best case scenario for them]

Anyway, Bret Stephens then segues into if the Hillary Clinton campaign can make a mistake when using data – and also Robert McNamara (Vietnam War) and Lehman Brotehrs – you can also make a mistake about climate change. He would have been better off quoting Benjamin Franklin. (I also think the comparison to the Clinton campaign’s erroors is also not good because the climate thing isn’t honest – it isn’t driven by honestly held hubris – while the Hillary Clinton campiagn really believed they would win.)

What he has after that, is a general argument about mistakes, and then he cites something that a former New York Times reporter wrote about there being a windening gap between what the scientists are learning and what the advocates are claiming.

But he cotes not one specific example of the advocates saying something wrong!!

Just generalities about them being wrong. And about too much certainty being counterproductive to the public and against the spirit of science. (Real science maybe but not science with a capital S which is infallable, or otherwise they wouldn’t call it science.)

This is no good. He’s not giving a single solitary example of getting anything wrong.

The only thing he does is say they are right about two things: The 1.5 degree warming of the northern hemisphere since 1880, and the human influence on that. Well, that’s the whole ballgame to most of these people. He doesn’t point out what they’re missing. He doesn’t point that none of the climate models work.

He doesn’t even say maybe only 50% of the warming was caused by what people did, or that you can’t even be sure what exactly caused it. Or that the year to year increment is very small and insignificant. And that it’s very bad to marry scientific error to public policy. and that asserting one’s moral superiority and treating skepptics as imbeciles wins very few converts (not so sure about that)

He’s not saying anything, except that they could be wrong for unspecified reasons, and not in what way they might be wrong.

Bret Stephens say quite a lot in his column, Sammy. He basically says that the entire global warming argument has been hijacked by fanatics and EVEN IF IT IS TRUE, nobody trusts fanatics.

He makes the same argument that Freeman Dyson made a couple years back: SCIENCE isn’t screaming and lawsuits, or who gets the headlines. It isn’t up for a vote. The people doing the worst damage to the idea of reducing global warming are NOT the skeptics, but the Inquisition-tactics of some supporters.

leo dicaprio has to save the planet from carbon emissions by flying on chartered jets with his supermodel girlfriends all over the world

and barack was recently doing his part to fight carbon emissions by cruising on the world’s most obnoxious yacht in the south pacific
i understand that david geffen’s yacht is actually powered by sails and solar panels
okay not really
it has a ginormous combustible engine
duh

If you post a review of “Before the Flood” , or maybe I should say if you post an honest review of “Before The Flood” Nat Geo DeCaprio or maybe one of their lawyers, or maybe it’s even organic to the YouTube people themselves, whatever, someone will make sure to have to have it dragged off.
They’ll fire off a copywrite complaint or threat and the YouTube will dutifully withdraw your review.

So this leaves only positive reviews. I wanted to see a negative review to save myself the time of watching Before the Flood. Life’s too short you know?
There ain’t one.

So due in part to my innate lazy I picked through what was to be had.Found this one. A guy’s video log of his weight loss where he mentions seeing the DiCaprio doc and it’s a life changing event for him. [YouTube]

Not too satisfying for me really.
So I broke down and watched “Before the Flood” for myself (it’s free for anyone except if you criticize). Check this out.

You know how you have the option to upvote a comment, not here at Patterico, but at other websites? There’s an unspoken etiquette that it’s bad form to up vote your own comment. And that’s a cultural thing.

Well I think what I discovered here by accident is a guy featured in Leo Di Caprio’s Before the Flood giving a glowing thumbs up video review of his own movie, breaking that social convention.

Check out those two links and tell me if that ain’t the same dude. (they’re cued up at the proper spot)

Bret Stephens say quite a lot in his column, Sammy. He basically says that the entire global warming argument has been hijacked by fanatics and EVEN IF IT IS TRUE, nobody trusts fanatics.

No he doesn’t say it has been hijacked. He treats the attackers as reasonable, but mistaken. He calls them “scientists, politicians and activists” not fanatics, then quotes and links to (online) Andrew Revkin here:

Who maybe is only disg\agreeing with hyperbole, like the kind that says we have only ten years till the point of no return – rfevkin is mostly writing about why people aren’t worried.

Bret Stephens says “I can almost hear the heads exploding.” which implies sincerity.

And he gets the whole quotation wrong.

When someone is honestly 55 percent right, that’s very good and there’s no use wrangling. And if someone is 60 percent right, it’s wonderful, it’s great luck, and let him thank God.

But what’s to be said about 75 percent right? Wise people say this is suspicious. Well, and what about 100 percent right? Whoever says he’s 100 percent right is a fanatic, a thug, and the worst kind of rascal.

— An old Jew of Galicia

At the end of the column I read this was actually said by what he calls the Polish poet Czeslaw Milosz, It turns out this was in a book called The Captive Mind published in 1953 by a Polish diplomat born in 1911, who defected in 1951 (and lived till 2004) and it was something of a classic about ideologies esopecially Stalinism because all had to beleive in it originally to gte to the positions they were in. I don’t know if theer actually was an old Jew of Galicia who said this first, but Bret Stephens gets this all wrong.

It’s not someone being 100% certain about something that is ssupicious – you could be 100% certain about the fact Ronald Reagan was elected president in 1980 and not before, or Einstein might be very confident about the theory of relativity, but someone claiming he is 100% rikght about everything! And Einstein was wrong about other things later even in physics.

He makes the same argument that Freeman Dyson made a couple years back: SCIENCE isn’t screaming and lawsuits, or who gets the headlines. It isn’t up for a vote. The people doing the worst damage to the idea of reducing global warming are NOT the skeptics, but the Inquisition-tactics of some supporters.

Great stuff. Have a signed first edition of his memoirs in my library. Always amused that he was granted a top security clearance at the Pentagon simply to narrate internal videos/films for training and so forth.

As part of a crackdown on religious extremism, the Chinese government has declared that parents will no longer be allowed to give their children Muslim names. Names such as Muhammad, Jihad, Mecca, and Saddam are now prohibited – a step officials say was necessary to avoid “exaggerating religious fervor” in the country.

Published under the sinister title of “Naming Rules for Ethnic Minorities”, the full list includes over two dozen banned names. News of the policy shocked Islamic faith leaders as well as advocates for religious freedom everywhere. In addition to Muslim names, beards and veils have also been banned in public.

Chinese officials are standing by their decision, promising punishments for those who disobey. Anyone who refuses to comply with the new policy risks fines and reductions in essential services like education and healthcare.

Notice how the Westerner who penned the report began with:”As part of a crackdown on religious extremism”? That’s a lie. Our little leftist Western journOlist knows full well all religion is illegal in China already. In reality it is a crackdown on Islam because recently there have been terrorist attacks perpetrated in China by moslems. Haven’t heard about that have you? That’s because the Chinese work to keep it quiet almost as hard as Western journOlists do.

The Chinese already imprison people caught practicing ANY religion for ten years hard labor. The moslem name thing is due to terrorist. In China. Whooda thunk? I guess when you’re part of a cult of world domination you just can’t overlook China no matter how akin the commies are to Islam.

No, Hoagie. There are five officially recognized religions in China: Buddhism, Taoism, Islam, Catholicism and Protestantism. Orthodox churches are not officially recognized but there are Russian Orthodox churches in Beijing, Shanghai and Hong Kong, and a Greek Orthodox Cathedral in Hong Kong.

I’m not going to go back and look, but if you search on the names you’ll learn that Chinese authorities have outlawed certain too overtly religious names for their Muslim minority, along with absurd beards.

The destruction of the Republican Party over the next four years is something I look forward to although not without mixed feelings, the main one being regret that not even one of them is likely to be hanged from a lamppost.

NK, has any eastern Orthodox church been desecrated by mistake by anyone mistaking it for a mosque? I’m thinking in the event I was drunk, knowing that in my corner of Lake County there is the Islamic Foundation mosque and St. Demetrious Greek Orthodox Church about 1/4 mile apart on OPlaine Rd South of the TriState Tollway.

Kind of interesting that some of the most fervent resistance to the Islamification of Europe is in the old Eastern Bloc where Christianity stayed strong even under communism and Soviet dominance while the dhimmitude prevails where Judeo-Christian values were given a back seat to multiculturalism.

Not that I know of, ulb. Have any mosques been desecrated in Illinois? There have been a handful of incidents in Trump country, but Illinois does not allow first cousins under the age of fifty to marry each other.

It also argues this includes people who are eligible for free lunches, but their parents aren’t so good at applying for things (that’s a skill, too), and there can be alanguage barrier, and some are sick, and and there are even some parents who are scared to apply for their children because of their illegal status.

It says also there are families are which are struggling financially but don’t meet the income requirements,

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